Not Totally Broken, Not Completely Whole
by bohowriter
Summary: In the end, it's the little things that break you, and force you find a new way to become whole. (Set after His Last Vow, discusses Mary's death.)


It was after Mary lost the baby that the trouble started. Her health began to spiral, until a doctor – not John – figured out what was going on, laid out the options, and confirmed the Watsons' suspicions that treatment would likely not improve the odds of survival. Mary wanted to try anyway, John had told Sherlock later that same day. Sherlock had looked up the five-year survival rate for her illness with and without treatment, and for once knew not to share the results. There was no turning back from the moment there was no hope left, and Sherlock, for once, didn't want any of them to be at that point yet.

But the day came eventually, and seemingly without warning (though the warning signs had been there, and Mary ignored them and John ignored them and Sherlock himself ignored them so they had a little more time to hope before they were broken completely). The night Mary went to hospital and never returned bled into the morning Sherlock got the phone call he knew would come, until the lines between the first days of Life After Mary all blurred together.

Once the funeral was over – once the tension and shaking people's hands and trying to forget why he was there while still remaining present had all ended – Sherlock knew John would come home. But he didn't say anything, didn't even offer the old room to John. Instead, he waited until the reception to sneak John's keys from his coat pocket and add the key to 221B back in its place. Sherlock hated sentiment, this was true, but he also felt grand gestures or conversations were rarely warranted when providing support. Sherlock knew the moment John needed to come home, he wouldn't be able to ask. And this way, he wouldn't have to.

As far as Sherlock knew, the key went unused for exactly one hundred and eleven days since it was placed back on the ring. After the funeral John took some time to himself, visited some friends abroad to get out of London, and upon his return began to slowly acclimate to Life After Mary. He went back to work at the clinic, and a bit later, joined Sherlock on cases again. Some nights John stayed at Baker Street, back in his old room. Others he spent at his and Mary's flat outside of town.

One Friday morning at breakfast, John mentioned that he was going to see about selling the flat. Sherlock didn't look up but simply nodded and replied, "Good." And that was that.

They'd solved the case the night before, so John went home, and Sherlock spent the day to himself. He knew if John were looking to sell his flat, he'd need to clean it and pack, which would take considerable time. It was just as well because it seemed like they were going into a dry-spell when it came to cases, and without a case to distract him, Sherlock knew John wouldn't stay just yet. Sherlock would miss John's presence, but there was always work to be done, and so the weekend passed uneventfully.

Sunday night – day one hundred and eleven since the Baker Street key's reappearance – found Sherlock kipping in his chair with the lights out. His eyes snapped open when he heard the lock click, and he tensed. Then the door opened, and the light from the hallway illuminated John Watson. John, with two bulging suitcases and a shaky gait and disheveled hair. John, looking like he'd seen a ghost. John, whose usual stoic mask was gone, letting the hidden brokenness show through.

The doctor only made it inside the flat a few steps before seeing Sherlock squinting into the light.

"Sherlock," he gasped, dropping the suitcases. "Didn't know you were in. I—I didn't see any light from the street. Thought you'd gone out."

"Fell asleep." Sherlock stood as John made his way over to his chair, nearly collapsing into it. "Fancy a drink?"

John nodded quickly, then placed his head into his hand ( _his trembling hand_ , Sherlock noted). He quickly procured a bottle of scotch and two glasses. Despite his other vices, Sherlock rarely drank. They would need alcohol tonight, however: for him, it would allow the ability to ask John what was wrong; for John, it would allow the ability to answer.

Both glasses were drained before Sherlock broke the silence.

"What happened?"

John sat slumped in his seat, eyes on the floor. "You mean you can't deduce it?"

Sherlock said nothing. Of course he could, if he wanted to. But he didn't want to.

John let out a breath, reached into his pocket, and pulled out a small case. Sherlock squinted.

"Contact lenses?"

"Yeah."

A beat.

"Mary's?"

John nodded, still looking away.

Sherlock reached across and poured his friend another glass. John took a gulp, blinked hard a few times, and then met Sherlock's eye.

"I'd been cleaning out her stuff," he began, voice tight. "Mostly giving it away, you know? Not much I can do with women's clothing," he chuckled darkly, and Sherlock forced a smile.

"Her books, and some odds and ends, I planned to keep. I could use them and think of her." John took another drink. "And—and the things I couldn't, I felt good about giving away. Was even thinking of taking her clothes to the clinic, for the women who come in and might need them…" his voice trailed off.

"Mary would like that," Sherlock remarked softly.

John squeezed his eyes shut again. "Yeah." The flat was silent, except for John's deep breathing. Sherlock poured himself a second glass and drank, trying to quiet the cacophony of deductions in his head, theories about how the contact lenses played into this.

"Even her shampoo I could give away," John started again. "I mean, it's all useful, her stuff. Except this," John held out the case again.

"They're just for her, you know? And I—somehow I missed them since I'd gone home, and I found them tonight."

"Where?"

"Behind the sink. The last night—her last night at home—she took them out before bed, and I guess when I was rushing around packing for hospital I knocked the case to the floor."

John sighed, a noise sounding too close to a whimper. He unscrewed one of the lids and held the case out further. "The lenses, they're still in the same solution, Sherlock. I thought it would've evaporated by now, but it's still there and they're still in it, waiting for her, and they're the one thing I can't do anything with. They're the only thing with no purpose."

Sherlock let out a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding, feeling as though it'd been knocked out of him. John was almost weeping, screwing the lid back on and shaking his head minutely. "Four months," he whispered. "Four months, and they're waiting there for her on the floor, and she's the only one who can use them, but she's never coming back."

Later he might worry about how anthropomorphizing contact lenses affected him so deeply. But for the moment, Sherlock only knew what John was saying was true and symbolized a brokenness that had to be fixed somehow. There were times for subtle displays of comfort and there were times for grand gestures. Sherlock wanted somewhere to direct this awful, dizzying energy that came from seeing one friend die and another friend fall apart.

Nearing a panic, he stood and sprinted into his bedroom. There on the shelf was a framed photograph of Sherlock, John, and Mary from the wedding, fortunately snapped not by the Mayfly-Man-Photographer, but on Molly's mobile. When she presented it to him later, printed off and in the frame, Sherlock had asked exactly _what_ he would do with such a thing.

Now he knew.

He returned to the sitting room and opened John's suitcases, knowing that if John had left his flat and intended to stay permanently at Baker Street-even if it'd happened in haste-he would bring his small box of mementos from the army. Sure enough, Sherlock found the box, opened it, and pocketed what he was looking for.

Back at his chair, Sherlock saw that John's face was screwed up against the pain, eyes closed, barely hidden in his hand propped up on the armrest. Sherlock stuck the photograph under his arm and took John's other hand in both of his. As gently as possible, he removed the case, and then walked towards the mantle.

The mantle was still home to the skull, but had also accumulated mementos from various cases, either as thank-you gifts (the cufflinks and tie pin Sherlock still didn't wear) or jokes (a statue of a dog from Dartmoor). Sherlock moved a few things aside, and set the framed photograph in the center. He then placed Mary's contact lens case in front of the picture, and beside that he laid John's army identification discs.

Sherlock blinked a few times quickly, feeling slightly less frantic, but not quite whole again, and sensed John standing beside him.

"I don't—I don't have a picture of just the two of you," Sherlock stammered an explanation. "But your—your identification discs, they're only meant for you. And you, ah, aren't in the army anymore. So you don't wear them. So now the lenses—" Sherlock's voice trailed off. He wasn't sure what he was trying to say. The lenses would be with something of John's, would be safe, and not waiting alone? That was stupid and the _worst_ kind of sentimentality. And yet, now that he had calmed down and analyzed his actions, it seemed like that was exactly what he was doing.

Attempting to immortalize the dead. He was just as broken as John.

John wiped at his face and walked away. Sherlock heard him retrieving something from near the door, and he came back with the deerstalker. He placed it on the mantle, against the frame.

Sherlock looked at John curiously, and the older man shrugged. "You didn't have anything for yourself. And that hat was only meant for you," he explained.

"But I hate it."

"So it's without purpose too, then. Fits right in with the rest of the family."

Despite everything from the night, everything from the one hundred and ten days prior, Sherlock broke into a wide smile. John grinned back, and their laughter started much like it had the very beginning: slowly and tentatively at first, before it became all-encompassing. The sound echoed from years before, before Mary or any of it; back to a time when they were both not totally broken, and not completely whole.


End file.
